Pence on backing possible Trump 2024 bid: ‘There might be somebody else I’d prefer more’ Read more
The most important question in politics is not whether the next president will be Democrat or Republican or what their policy agenda might be, but when the next president will win office and be inaugurated.
We can tell almost immediately that Trump is going to win reelection in 2020 and that, with the 2020 election approaching, the next incumbent will not be Republican.
But Trump is doing enough to ensure he stays in office for the next four years, while also doing enough to indicate he is unlikely to relinquish the presidency in 2024. In other words, what that president will be in two years may be more important than what he becomes in 2024.
The public isn’t asking about 2020, but about 2024 and beyond. And, it doesn’t matter whether or not the president decides to run against his successor, if the two of them remain friends, family, and allies.
The question is, “Which man is more likely to be the Republican nominee for president in 2024 and beyond?”
Is POTUS Donald Trump going to run against the next Democratic president in 2020?
Pence would be the most popular choice – he remains popular with the base, particularly younger conservatives – but the biggest question about him is whether he will run.
At the end of July, Pences campaign manager, Jim Talent, said they hopedPence would run, with the following comments:
“The president has no obligation to run for another office when his time is up,” Talent said. “Whether or not the president runs, that’s totally up to him, it’s his life. And so I think it’s a real shame that he’s choosing to duck out now.”
Pence has declined to say whether he would run or not, except that it was “something that I’d have to think about”.
Pence’s political positioning on two issues – immigration and trade – is critical to understanding whether he would